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Mako Mermaids and Mermen
Mako: Island of Secrets (2013-), airing in the U.S. as The Mako Mermaids, is a sequel to H2O: Just Add Water that expands on the mythology and introduces that rarest of creatures, a merman.Actually,...
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Arabic and Class Rings: Cruising at West Point
Rock Island, September 1976It's the beginning of my junior year in high school, time to register for the SATs, the college entrance exams. My parents are vehemently opposed to the idea of college, but...
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Free You, Be You: Beefcake and Bullying
"Free You Be You" is an anti-bullying video, produced by Shirley Pierce and Angus Ledgerwood, being promoted extensively in Australia. Instead of the usual tactic of telling kids how to recognize...
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The Great Hookup Contest of Philadelphia: 15 Guys in 24 Hours
Philadelphia, March 2013David from San Francisco has just arrived for a week-long visit. I pick him up at the airport, drop his stuff off at my apartment, and take him to dinner at a tapas place...
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It's Raining Men
Humidity's rising, barometer's getting lowAccording to all sources, the street's the place to go.Cause tonight for the first time, just about half past tenFor the first time in history, it's gonna...
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The Backsliders at the Ponderosa Steak House
Rock Island, May 1969When I was growing up, my church had a huge number of prohibitions. We discussed them and memorized them for prizes in Sunday school class, heard sermons about them on Sunday...
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Gather the Faces of Men: Homophobia in American Literature Class
When I was a junior in college, I took courses in "The Modern British Novel", "The American Renaissance," and "Modern American Literature," plus German, French, and Spanish Literature. And I forever...
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10 Weirdest Hookup Sites
It's easy to meet guys for hookups and dates in a gay neighborhood, where almost everyone around you is gay. But in the straight world it's tricky. Most of the guys around are not interested, no...
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Top 10 Public Penises of Munich
Munich has one of the biggest, most vibrant gay communities in the world, centered around the classic gay neighborhood, Glockenbachviertel. You can dance, cruise, and hook up around the clock at...
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Shock Treatment: Romance is Not a Children's Game
In the summer of 1981, I went to see Shock Treatment, which was widely advertised as "the sequel to The Rocky Horror Picture Show!" Ok, so it starred Brad and Janet from the original movie, played by...
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A Week of Dates with Daddies and Bears
Plains, June 2016It's fun being a twink magnet, but sometimes I long for the company of men my own age, men who remember dial phones and David Cassidy, who don't spend the entire evening texting and...
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Pepe Le Pew, the Bisexual Looney Toons Skunk
We know about Bugs Bunny's forays into drag in the old Looney Toon shorts, but what about Pepe LePew?The faux-French accented skunk was named after the Pepe Le Moko character (Charles Boyer) in Algiers...
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Eddie Cantor: The Craziest Reason for Gay Rumors
One of the cartoons I saw on Captain Ernie's Cartoon Showboat as a kid in the 1960s was Billboard Frolics (1935), which spoofed contemporary radio stars. I didn't recognize any of them at the time, of...
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Kenneth Anger: Experimental Homoerotic Filmmaker of the 1950s
Kenneth Anger (1927-) was an experimental filmmaker of the 1950s and 1960s, known for his surreal, chaotic imagery. There is no spoken dialogue; instead, the actors pantomime. The background...
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12 Beefcake Boys and Men of "The Fosters"
The Fosters (2013-) is a groundbreaking drama on ABC Family about a lesbian couple (Stef and Lena) with five children, biological, adopted, and foster (Brandon, Jesus, Jude, Callie, Mariana)....
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10 Reasons Why "Kiss Me, Kate" is a Gay Classic
1. It's a musical about the backstage antics during a performance of Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew, which has a gay subtext. The dissolute Petruchio comes to Padua to marry a woman for her money...
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Beefcake and Heterosexism in My Netflix Recommendations
During the last week of May and first week of June, I was very busy, with late hours, getting caught in the rain, and lots of dates and hookups. As a result, my immune system was impacted enough for...
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The Unsolved Murder and the Two Footlong Redheads
When I was growing up in Rock Island, I often heard about the biggest unsolved murder in Chicago history. It appeared in "Spooky Chicago" television pieces every Halloween, and in newspaper articles...
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Bobbseys, Boxcars, and Beefcake
I was never much of a fan of the mystery genre, but many gay kids liked the gentle, pre-Hardy Boys exploits of The Famous Five or their American counterparts, the Bobbsey Twins and the Boxcar...
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Fred Dryer's Nude Modeling Career
Hunter (1984-1991) aired during the Reagan-Bush years of conservative retrenchment, on Saturday nights, aimed at an audience of oldsters sitting at home complaining about how much better things when...
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